Tuesday, July 14, 2009

We girls headed to Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo again today. Our first stop was the butterfly building. Julia had a chance to walk (holding my hands, of course) and check out all the beautiful butterflies and hummingbirds that freely flew around us. I didn't have a chance to take a picture of Jules, since I was holding her, but I did get a shot of Evelyn. There's a butterfly in the bush on the right, but it's pretty hard to see it...The Skyfari is a new ski-lift type ride at the zoo. Grandpa Luster hung out with Julia while Evelyn and I took a ride through the tree tops. It was so cool to see giraffes, cheetahs, ostriches, rhinos and other animals from the air. I never once mentioned to Evelyn that this might be something scary (fear of heights and so on), and she never hinted at being nervous.We fed the fish from the bridge, Julia waved and said "Hi!" to people, we saw the baby sea lion, Julia waved and said "Hi!" to people, we ate lunch, Julia waved and said "Hi!" to people, we checked out the bears, Julia waved and said "Hi!" to people...you get the picture. Julia made so many people laugh with her wave and "Hi!"

Julia caught on to what we were doing when we were feeding fish from the bridge. I had been giving her Goldfish crackers to snack on while we threw cat food type grub to the fish in the lake. Next thing I know, Julia was pushing her Goldfish through the fence in an attempt to feed the fish. Silly baby.

With Evelyn present, a zoo trip isn't complete without riding the train. Just like two weeks ago, Julia cuddled with me during the train ride, probably because the steam engine and train whistle is so loud. This time, however, Julia fell asleep on me! I think the heat and humidity simply wore her out. After our train ride, the engineers filled up the tender with water and diesel. Diesel fuel in a steam engine confused Evelyn, and she inched closer to the tender and locomotive for a closer look. The next thing we knew, one of the engineers was showing us around the engine, explaining that it's an oil-burning steam engine, here's where the fire box is, look inside to see the fire, and so on. Evelyn sure is a lucky little train girl.We wrapped up today's visit at the petting zoo. Yes, goats tried to eat Julia and the stroller, but I just kept moving, and they eventually gave up.